How to cull my entire flock of 60+ chickens?

[Jesusfreak101]

I sorry for your problems but thank you for the post about ideal poultry i did not see that on their website and will be canceling my order for oct 23 black boilers as i dont want my layers to get that!!

 

[desertmarcy]

Thank you for replying! That's what is so worrysome for me. The OP's post, the reply from Ideal hatchery saying in my interpretation that yup, our birds might have it, we take no responsibility. I get latent diseases and carriers of those, FIP, FELV, etc in cats for instance, sometimes only show up when an animal is stressed or compromised. Same with seemingly healthy chickens. However, If I know I have an infected flock, know how tricky the disease is, why would I not either cut my losses and cull, or do my best to not perpetuate the disease? Why would I be incubating eggs from a known carrier flock? We're not talking about a backyard hobby flock here. We're talking about a lot of infected birds and more in the incubator . Will those fertile carrier eggs or pullets find their way to devastate the next new chicken keeper? With all respect to the OP, please turn off the bator. Please for everyone's sake, do your very best to not perpetuate. IMO, there is honor.

@Mutt Farm here is something else to consider. You can break the cycle by pre-treating hatching eggs with certain antibiotics prior to incubating. This has been shown to keep the Mycoplasma from infecting the new chicks. The parent, infected stock, would have to be destroyed prior to introducing new chicks into the yard. This could be an option for someone who has valuable show birds, for instance, or a line of birds that someone has worked with for generations. That is what I am facing right now. I don't have MG, but I have MS (M. synoviae) in my flock. From what I have read, the disease is not as devastating as M. gallisepticum but still not something I'd want to spread around. I had to do the testing myself since Arizona does not participate in NPIP. Cost me around $500 to buy the antigens and all the supplies--blood vacutainers, needles/syringes, etc. Fortunately I have a lab background so the testing is easy for me and I already had a centrifuge to spin the blood to get serum. Bleeding the birds is another story. Difficult! I believe the infection came to me in some hatching eggs I bought from a well known breeder. Never even thought there'd be a problem, but there it is. Some of the bloodlines I'm working with are not replaceable, they are not just run of the mill hatchery birds. If I were to cull everything, I might as well get out of chickens. I know people who have it in their flock and they don't sell birds and try to breed for resistance. Only keeping the strong or those that show no symptoms for next year's breeders. It is a difficult decision to cull everything when the possibility of just getting reinfected from wild birds exists.

 

[Mutt Farm]

@desertmarcy Thank you so much for taking the time to help me better understand this. I'll need to sign off this evening to take care of the DH and critters, but hope to follow this.

 

[perchie.girl]

Quote:
Many of these big hatcheries Get their chicks from small hatcheries and I suspect this is why they cant guarantee some things....

So far I have had great luck buying feed store chicks...

my next go round will be home incubated though. I can get purebred bloodlines from small breeders and hatch them myself. I dont care if I get 50 percent cockrels... though. I have pleanty of room for a Bachelor flock. even set aside a pen partition just for them.

Once i get started again I will close the flock there are only a couple of breeders here in San Diego I would take a grown bird from any way.

I am soo glad my emphasis will be on Guineas....

deb

 

[Mutt Farm]

@Mutt Farm here is something else to consider. You can break the cycle by pre-treating hatching eggs with certain antibiotics prior to incubating. This has been shown to keep the Mycoplasma from infecting the new chicks. The parent, infected stock, would have to be destroyed prior to introducing new chicks into the yard. This could be an option for someone who has valuable show birds, for instance, or a line of birds that someone has worked with for generations. That is what I am facing right now. I don't have MG, but I have MS (M. synoviae) in my flock. From what I have read, the disease is not as devastating as M. gallisepticum but still not something I'd want to spread around. I had to do the testing myself since Arizona does not participate in NPIP. Cost me around $500 to buy the antigens and all the supplies--blood vacutainers, needles/syringes, etc. Fortunately I have a lab background so the testing is easy for me and I already had a centrifuge to spin the blood to get serum. Bleeding the birds is another story. Difficult! I believe the infection came to me in some hatching eggs I bought from a well known breeder. Never even thought there'd be a problem, but there it is. Some of the bloodlines I'm working with are not replaceable, they are not just run of the mill hatchery birds. If I were to cull everything, I might as well get out of chickens. I know people who have it in their flock and they don't sell birds and try to breed for resistance. Only keeping the strong or those that show no symptoms for next year's breeders. It is a difficult decision to cull everything when the possibility of just getting reinfected from wild birds exists.

OH. I'm beginning to understand with your help. OP, if you prefer I start a new thread rather than rambling on here to learn, please feel free to ask me, I appreciate your patience and feel terrible for your situation. So like the OP's case, if the neighbor's birds have it, the hatcheries have it and even some very well known breeders have it, the flocks will continue to re-infect each other, so culling or pre-treating eggs could be pointless? This sounds like a horrible disease. I'm going to spend a few days researching. Thank you all for being patient with my assumptions, ignorance and my questions.

 

[Mutt Farm]

OH. I'm beginning to understand with your help. OP, if you prefer I start a new thread rather than rambling on here to learn, please feel free to ask me, I appreciate your patience and feel terrible for your situation. So like the OP's case, if the neighbor's birds have it, the hatcheries have it and even some very well known breeders have it, the flocks will continue to re-infect each other, so culling or pre-treating eggs could be pointless? This sounds like a horrible disease. I'm going to spend a few days researching. Thank you all for being patient with my assumptions, ignorance and my questions.

Many of these big hatcheries Get their chicks from small hatcheries and I suspect this is why they cant guarantee some things....

So far I have had great luck buying feed store chicks...

my next go round will be home incubated though. I can get purebred bloodlines from small breeders and hatch them myself. I dont care if I get 50 percent cockrels... though. I have pleanty of room for a Bachelor flock. even set aside a pen partition just for them.

Once i get started again I will close the flock there are only a couple of breeders here in San Diego I would take a grown bird from any way.

I am soo glad my emphasis will be on Guineas....

deb

I bought from M McM and Meyers with no problems, but now I'm afraid. I was going to double my flock next year with some pretty fancy birds, but don't have room for 50% roos.

 

[perchie.girl]

Quote:
There is always freezer camp. But with some quick leg work you probably could sell them off if they are good bloodlines. I dont have a problem with freezer camp myself. Extra roos are good to have around to do guard duty as well.

deb

 

[casportpony]

Also, Ideal Poultry says this:
Quote: Thanks for posting this.

-Kathy

 

[DanielKYantis]

I've had about 40 eggs hatch and I noticed at least 10 chicks died without showing any reason for them dieing. I think (think) it's the MG getting them... No symptoms until death and when I come out in morning I have a new dead bird. But the ones that have lived have seemed all ok.

 

[Dorthia]

The ones without a natural resistance and any weakened fowl will be weeded out by the MIcroplasma. I wouldn't hatch chicks with carriers. It is your chioce of course. However continue management. If this is an epidemic in your area, getting new bird is probably going to lead you down same road.

Please let us know how managemet is going.